


love and a bit with a dog

by languisity



Category: Fall Out Boy
Genre: BDSM, Emotional Constipation, M/M, Non-Sexual Kink, Puppy Play
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-12
Updated: 2013-04-12
Packaged: 2017-12-08 06:22:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/758105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/languisity/pseuds/languisity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pete knows that he wants to be Patrick's something-- to be <i>Patrick's</i>-- before he knows he wants to be <i>with</i> Patrick. They don't start out as mutually exclusive occurrences. They still aren't and Pete is trying to reconcile that fact.</p>
            </blockquote>





	love and a bit with a dog

**Author's Note:**

> Archiving. Written for bandombigbang forever ago.

It starts out as a joke.

In a fit of frustration that neither one of them can remember the cause of anymore, Patrick takes a pair of twice-worn, rolled up socks and throws them halfway across the hotel room he and Pete are sharing. Pete doesn't move from where he is on the floor with his notebook because it's his room too, whether or not there's a Patrick raging in the corner. There's also the fact that he sometimes gets a perverse thrill out of watching Patrick get angry at such a close proximity. It's a lot like sitting out on your porch to watch a tornado a block away.

Pete stays and watches as the socks arc over his head. They land a few feet away from him, so he climbs up on all fours to crawl over to where they fall and ducks down to pick them up in his mouth. It seems like a good idea at the time, and anyway, he has a pen in one hand; it would've been hard to crawl while he was holding socks _and_ a pen. Except that doesn't explain why he's crawling in the first place, and he ends up ditching the pen on his way to Patrick, anyway.

It's still funny, though. Just a joke, he thinks, until he drops the socks at Patrick's feet to look up and see Patrick not-laughing at him. He isn't sure what to call the look Patrick is giving him.

Pete shivers, suddenly acutely aware that he is shirtless. The room isn't cold, but he can feel goose bumps prickling up along the back of his neck and arms.

Pete wipes his mouth off, swallows, and sits back on his heels.

Patrick is the first to break the silence. He tilts his head down so that the brim of his hat hides his eyes, and says, "Quit fucking around."

Pete blinks and isn't entirely sure he doesn't hear something rattle when he shakes his head. "What?"

"I'm getting room service and they're gonna come in and see you like," Patrick pauses to gesture at Pete's shirtless-ness and general Pete-ness.

"Yeah, no. Sure. Whatever," Pete says. He puts on the first shirt he finds, completely forgetting to argue, and tries to stop shaking.

*

A week before his twenty-eighth birthday, while their buses are parked outside of a gas station somewhere in the middle of Michigan on their way to Detroit, Pete kisses Patrick.

He does it quickly, on the couch in the lounge while Joe's asleep, just catching the corner of Patrick's mouth. He thinks Patrick might have tried to turn into, that he tries to kiss Pete back. Eventually Pete shifts away, but doesn't move back like he's daring Patrick to move away first.

Patrick doesn't move and Pete watches as he closes his eyes for just a little longer than a blink, takes a deep breath, and exhales slowly. "You--" Patrick says, but stops, opening his eyes and finally shifting away from Pete to double the space between them. "You wanna tell me what that was?"

"Right," Pete says, but he doesn't elaborate. Distantly, he's kind of wishing he didn't just fuck up movie night. "Okay." He sits back away from Patrick, turned in to face him. "I kissed you."

"I got that," Patrick says. He touches the back of his hand to his mouth as if to wipe it but stops and lets his hand drop back down to his lap, licking his lips instead. "So what the fuck?"

"So the execution was shitty, but I stand by the intent?" Pete says. His voice lilts up at the end, making him sound unsure, and he frowns. Pete is sure. He thinks he’s always wanted to do that, needed to, like maybe every moment up until now was just the set up for it.

"What does that even-- never mind," Patrick says. "Look, okay. I don't know what's up. I don't know what this--" he says, gesturing between them, "--is about. Or what you're thinking or what you want, but--"

"Nothing. I mean, it's something, and I mean it. But it's not like. I just needed... I don't know," Pete says, ducking his head down so he doesn't have to look Patrick in the eye. He sounds strained and nervous even to his own ears. "It seemed like a good idea at the time, dude."

Patrick frowns and tugs the brim of his hat down. "I feel like we might've had a conversation where you did something and said it seemed like a good idea at the time, but it wasn't."

"Then I'm sorry. Let's just forget about it." Pete looks up to see Patrick frowning, and half smiles as he stands to leave. He reaches a hand up briefly to tug at his hair, and then tilts his head in the direction of his bed.

"I'm gonna lay down or whatever," he says, and walks away, but not fast enough to miss Patrick's sigh.

 

*

Pete is aware of the concept of selfish truths. It's a subject that comes up a lot in therapy. There are three different kinds of truth that Pete deals with in varying frequencies; there's the truth you tell solely for the benefit of the person you're telling; there's the truth you tell to make yourself feel better no matter the outcome; and then there's the kind of truth that is more or less mutually beneficial.

A lot of Pete's truths are selfish, and the payoff is never really worth it, but it's a hard habit to break.

The point is that Pete is working on it. He knows that what happened with Patrick was wrong, he just can't quite care enough about it. Not enough to apologize and mean it, and definitely not enough to take it back.

*

It isn't as if things aren't going to get awkward. They do and they are. Pete figures that this is the cost of unburdening yourself; you always end up burdening someone else in the process. It's fine, even freeing, until it isn't and then Andy is pulling him to the side one day muttering something along the lines of, "I don't care what you did, you just need to make it right."

Pete's idea of 'making it right' is more like pretending nothing happened at all in the first place. It's a thing they all do; better friendships through repression.

This time they're on Joe and Pete's bus. Most people would wonder why they have two buses when they spend so much time on one or the other, but most people aren't friends with Pete. Sometimes it helps, though, if you have a place to kick Pete out of, or if he has a place to stay so that you can walk away.

"There's _pizza_ in your beard, man. What the fuck," Pete says. He points at Joe's face with one hand and wipes demonstratively at his own stubble covered chin with the other.

Joe sticks his tongue out like he's trying to lick up whatever has been caught.

"No, man. It's like, it's cheese, Joe," Patrick says. The corners of his mouth quirk up a little, almost a smile. Pete knows because he keeps looking over at Patrick between fits of laughter.

Andy walks over to the tiny makeshift kitchen, takes one look at Joe, then turns right back around again, and Patrick almost loses it completely.

"Looks like a fucking money shot in your fucking-- your fucking face pubes!"

"Hah," Joe laughs, "Face pubes," and picks the string of cheese out of his beard to eat it.

"Seriously. It's like the fucking attack of the face pubes," Pete says in reference to the fact that Joe and Andy are apparently on a shaving strike, and neither Pete nor Patrick have shaved in a few days.

Pete turns in time to catch Patrick make a face and grins at him just before deciding it's a good idea to climb onto Patrick's lap. He straddles Patrick's thighs, facing him so that he is wedged between Patrick and the table, and is kind of surprised he manages it. Joe gets up then, leaving to join Andy.

"Move, Pete. Seriously, I mean it," Patrick says. He's annoyed, definitely, but not enough for Pete to worry. He even laughs a little when he calls after Joe.

"Fuck you, Trohman! Come on! Don't leave me in here with him like this."

"Yeah, no," Joe calls back just as Pete says, "What? What, Patrick, what? I'm just-- look, okay?"

He grabs onto Patrick's shirt with one hand to keep steady as he pulls out his phone.

"No, not okay." Patrick moves like he's going to try to push Pete off his lap, but stops altogether. Pete feels him take a breath, exhale and force himself to relax. When he says, "Get off me, Pete," his voice is mostly calm.

"But I need photographic evidence," Pete says, holding up his phone and trying to line up a shot even as Patrick turns his head to the side and tips his chin down. "Do you know there are people on the internet, Patrick--" Pete starts.

"Fuck your internet."

"People who think you're like, twelve or something," Pete goes on, talking over Patrick. "They need to be informed of your epic manly status."

"Get the _fuck_ off me, Pete," Patrick says, low. His cheeks are tinged pink and his lips are pressed into a tense line.

Pete knows that this isn't funny anymore, that it probably never really had been, but he can't seem to make himself stop.

"But I feel so close to you," Pete mutters as he nuzzles against Patrick's jaw. He shivers a little at the scratch of stubble against stubble, and then licks Patrick's cheek.

Patrick's fist hits Pete somewhere around his diaphragm. It's fast and they're too close for it to do much, but Pete curls forward anyway, his eyes going wide as he gasps. He tips his head forward to rest his forehead on Patrick's shoulder, and Patrick turns to speak in his ear.

"Stop it." Patrick's voice is low and serious, and his lips brush against the shell of Pete's ear as he speaks. Pete finds himself getting suddenly and inexplicably hard.

"Fuck, fine, whatever. I'm done," Pete says when he finds his voice again, and nods.

"Good," Patrick says, and pushes Pete off his shoulder. "Now move."

Pete gets a picture of Patrick later, but the flash goes off and Patrick's stubble, along with most of his face, is washed out. He posts it on his journal anyway with the caption _smile for the petepetepetepetepeterazzi_.

*

Pete knows that he wants to be Patrick's something-- to be _Patrick's_ \-- before he knows he wants to touch Patrick's dick. They don't start out as mutually exclusive occurrences. They still aren't and Pete is trying to reconcile that fact.

It's a lot like the separation of church and state; the concept makes sense in theory, but the former always has an impact on the latter. Like Patrick is Pete's official religion, and every decision Pete makes is met with the conflict of a just law and eternal damnation.

He tries to write it out once and ends up tearing out the sheets of paper from his notebook, balling them up, and then smoothing out the pages again and taping them back in. He'll end up using that for something anyway.

*

Once, when Hemmy was still a puppy, Pete watched him pounce on a grasshopper. He caught it in five tries and then pawed at it until most of its legs were missing. After that, Hemmy picked up the grasshopper in one bite, trotted over to Pete, and coughed up what was left of it at his feet.

Pete had picked him up, let Hemmy lick him smack on the lips, and said, "Thanks, dude. You give the best presents." It was all about accepting things in the spirit in which they were intended.

That scene is playing in the back of his mind when he drops a packet of candy-- neon colored gummy worms-- onto Patrick's lap. He tells his brain it can shut the fuck up, though, because he isn't his fucking dog; Pete doesn't trot.

"Okay." Patrick closes the magazine he's looking through and sets it down to pick up the candy. "Thank you?"

"It's, you know--" Pete gestures, but Patrick isn't looking. He stuffs his hands in his pockets instead and shifts from foot to foot, his shoulders hunched. "A peace offering or whatever." An 'I'm sorry for the licking and random boner' peace offering.

"I don't eat these, Pete," Patrick reminds Pete quietly.

Pete shrugs. "I do?"

"So. Okay, so, I just. I want to get this straight," Patrick says, looking up at Pete now, "You got me a candy that I don't like as a peace offering?"

"Look, fine," Pete says, irritated. "We can share it."

"What the fuck is 'yellow number five', anyway?" Patrick asks, looking back down at the package and frowning at the list of ingredients.

"It's--" Pete shakes his head and holds out a hand. "Forget it. Just give it back."

"No, okay, fine. Fine, okay? I'm sorry. That was a dick move. Thank you very much, Pete. I accept your--" Patrick waves the bag of candy, "your peace offering."

Pete sighs and nods down at his shoes. "Okay. Because I really didn't--"

"Yeah, I know. It's fine. Just... maybe you need to lay off a little, okay?"

"It wasn't a problem before," Pete says, quick and defensive, but wanting to sound like he doesn't care, like he isn't begging a little.

He suddenly gets the feeling they're having two completely different conversations.

"It wasn't--” Patrick stops for a moment. He seems to be considering the situation at hand, before saying, "I don't know what you're expecting, Pete."

This is probably a logical response, Pete concedes, and starts to clarify only to realize he doesn't really know either.

"I'm-- I--" is as far as Pete gets before he runs out of steam.

Patrick shrugs and smiles in a way that more closely resembles a grimace, turning his hands palm up to show Pete that they are empty: _I have nothing to offer you_. What pisses Pete off is that he knows it isn't true. It doesn't feel anything close to the truth.

"Fuck you," Pete says. He sounds more stunned than angry, and Patrick goes from looking apologetic to irritated.

"I didn't do anything, okay? You did. And it's not like I can un-know it. You can't undo it."

"It's not a big deal. Fuck."

Patrick shakes his head, angry now. Pete hears the crinkle of plastic as Patrick's hand clenches around the packet of candy. "You don't get to do that,"

"Fucking what?" Pete snaps back.

"Fucking--" Patrick says too loud, almost yelling, but quiets himself. When he speaks again his voice is quiet, even. "You don't get to decide if that was a big deal."

"No, seriously. Just, fuck you. You don't even know--"  
  
Patrick’s eyes narrow. " _You_ don't even know, Pete. You don't even fucking _think_ , because if you did you'd have fucking quit while you were ahead."

"I want--" Pete says, just this side of pleading.

"And maybe I don't. Maybe I think it's a really fucking bad idea," Patrick snaps. Pete flinches. "Which, you know, it's really fucking hilarious that you didn't even consider that."

Whatever wave of righteous indignation that Pete has been riding crashes.

This time Patrick leaves first. Pete takes a deep breath and tries to ease the tightness in his chest.

*

In the list of Pete's least favorite things, being ignored by Patrick is probably number three. It's too much like being punished.

There was this one time when they were just starting out, Pete punched a guy. He could have made justifications for it-- not enough sleep, not enough pills or too many pills, not enough energy, too much pressure-- but the truth was that he did it because he wanted to. He punched a guy, and punched and punched until his hand felt numb and Andy, along with two other guys he'd never seen before, had to drag Pete off of him.

The next day, Patrick had looked at Pete's bruised and swollen fingers, and asked, "Can you play?" He sounded like he already knew what the answer would be.

Pete flexed his fingers and tried not to wince. "Yeah?"

"Okay," Patrick agreed, but didn't look convinced. He handed Pete a bass and made him play, watching Pete's hands. Pete's fingers were stiff and swollen and it hurt, but he was stubborn and kept trying until Patrick huffed out a sigh and made him stop.

"We'll work around you," Patrick said, and then he didn't say more than he needed to for the next five days out of their shitty little tour.

So it isn't as if this is the first time, and it won't be the last, but it doesn't make it any easier to take. In fact, there's something so much worse about it this time around because of the conspicuous lack of stony silences and intermittent glaring. This is more like being shunned politely. Patrick even smiles in Pete's direction a few times, and that only makes it worse because then Pete forgets himself. He'll forget and lean in or sit too close, and Patrick will tense and move away, and then Pete remembers again.

Then they go on a break and Patrick gets a girlfriend.

It isn't as instantaneous as it feels. There are weeks between the end of tour, when Patrick and Pete have gotten back to something more like their version of normal, and when Patrick meets her and eventually introduces his girlfriend to Pete. Her name is Angela. She's nice but funny in a sharp, mean way. She teases Patrick in public and whispers loudly about how the light freckles across his shoulders make her want to play connect-the-dots with them, but she never does it too much. Pete knows about those freckles; they're lighter than the ones on Patrick's arms, and Pete staring at him long enough to notice them in the first place got him punched once.

There are other things, too. Things significantly less important to Patrick's relationship with her, like how well she debates politics with Pete, is generally not creeped out by Andy, and never really writes Joe off as just a pot head. That doesn't mean she actually likes any of them, or that they are as in like with her as Patrick is, just that things are good for Patrick and tolerable for everyone else.

"Besides," Pete had said once, muttering to Joe as he twisted the cap off of a bottle of beer, "I'm not the one that's gotta fuck her."

And yeah, that's pretty much the point.

The thing is that Pete actually likes Angela. He likes her within about the first fifteen minutes of meeting her, almost against his will. He likes her curly brown hair and wide eyes. He likes that she is almost tall enough to look awkward standing next to Patrick, but manages somehow to make herself look small. He likes _her_ , which is a shame because he can't stand seeing her and Patrick together. If Pete's being honest, things have always kind of been that way. He's happy that Patrick is happy, he just isn't happy about the situation facilitating that happiness. There's a lot of deep emotional conflict there.

Patrick introduces Pete and Angela over lunch at a restaurant that wants to be a diner but is too clean and over priced to manage it. Pete gets there early by mistake and downs two cokes and a beer before Patrick and Angela arrive. He's about to flag down the waiter for another beer but ends up waving instead when he catches sight of Patrick heading towards him.

"Hey," Pete says when they're close enough.

"Hey," Patrick says as they get settled, letting Angela slide into the booth before him. "Pete, this is Angela. Angela, meet Pete."

"Hi, Pete," Angela says, smiling politely. She holds her hand out and Pete shakes it, releasing it quickly.

"Hi, Angela," Pete replies, and tries to return her smile, but it feels too sharp to be friendly.

"You can call me Angie," she says, and she's still smiling but it's starting to falter. "Please."

"Right." Pete nods in acknowledgement; he isn't going to call her "Angie" or "Ange" or any variation thereof, but he did hear her. "How are you-- you two?" He reaches for his beer, picking it up to take a swig before he remembers that it's empty.

"We're good," Angela says, and Patrick looks up from the menu in front of him to half-smile at Pete as if in agreement. Pete is struck by the familiarity of that look, of Patrick being part of a "we" and "us" that has nothing at all to do with Pete. "You?"

"I'm alright. I think this is where you prove yourself to the overbearing best friend," Pete says, and he knows he shouldn't have, but it's worth the look Patrick gives him. This is followed by a short, awkward pause that would have been longer had the waiter not chosen that exact moment to arrive to take their orders. He leaves with the promise that he'll be back shortly and then Angela starts to talk.

Angela is a graphic designer. She used to do a lot of work with bands but, "Indie bands have a one hundred percent divorce rate and I never got paid," which is why she gave it up to do sites for photographers and newly discovered clothing designers. Pete also learns that she likes folk rock and is the reason that Patrick has picked up obscure British slang.

They hold hands while they eat, and Pete can't even really be annoyed by it. It isn't obnoxious because Patrick isn't the type to be obnoxious about things like relationships and public displays of affection. He and Angela are just obviously together and obviously very happy about it.

Her phone starts to chime in the middle of a story about Patrick and a bag of baby carrots that Pete isn't quite following anyway, and she sighs as she checks whatever message she's gotten. "I'm sorry. I have to go; I have a meeting... thing," Angela says quietly, and kisses Patrick on the cheek. "I'm sorry," she says again, this time directed at Pete.

Patrick stands to let her out of the booth, his hand finding its way to the small of her back to guide her out, and Pete shifts his gaze to the table as they say their goodbyes. He glances up again just in time to see Angela kiss Patrick on the cheek again and then wave to Pete.

Pete slouches down in the booth and waits until Angela is out of sight and Patrick is seated again before he says, "You got yourself one classy broad, von Stump." Patrick doesn't need his approval, Pete knows, but he says it anyway because it's true.

"Yeah," Patrick says with a small smile. There's something soft and quietly happy in his voice when he adds, "I like her alright."

"Yeah," Pete echoes, and stretches out his right foot to tap against Patrick's left one. "Lucky her."

*

"Hey. Hi," Pete stutters at Patrick's voicemail. The beep comes sooner than he thinks it will because Patrick has one of those annoyingly concise voicemails: _this is Patrick. Leave a message_.

"So, hey, dude. Uh, it's been a while, man. I feel-- I kinda feel like we haven't talked in a while."

That's ridiculous. Patrick and Pete have gone without talking to each other for months-- while they were sharing a place, even-- and sometimes Pete didn't even notice. The only reason Pete's noticing at all now is because he wants and he can't have.

"You're probably busy, right? I don't know, Rick. It's like you're like the most exclusive club, and I feel like I've been fucking wait listed." It doesn’t feel manipulative until Pete's done talking, and by then all he can do is laugh.

"Anyway, whatever. Call me back when you're not busy."

*

Watching Patrick juggle relationships is funny, albeit in an admittedly dark way, and Pete isn't doing a lot to help. It doesn't seem fair to Patrick, but Pete has been running on impulse for so long that everything feels five times removed, inevitable. There is never any plan other than to react and react and react until there is nothing left to react to anymore, or he runs out of energy; whichever comes first.

The band starts to put together a new album before they take a break that they all agreed they need, but that Pete still doesn't want to happen. It's supposed to be a real break, one without an end date or future plans and expectations attached to it, and it terrifies him that the one true constant in his life won't exist anymore for that time.

In then end, the way everything comes together is a special kind of perfect. It's all so much like the first time, but better because _they_ are better, because they don't have to try to fit anymore; they just do. They trade beats and riffs and words back and forth until they have something they can work with, and then they spend a month in a studio working desperately like they aren't already going home to houses and condos in L.A.

Angela tags along to the studio with Patrick a few times, and maybe that's part of what makes Pete feel like he's living in a retrospective of his own life. They aren't really anything alike, but Pete can't help thinking of Anna when he sees Angela. He thinks it's something in the way Angela shows up at the studio with the same air that Anna did at band practices. There's that same general look of support mixed with boredom. The difference, Pete supposes, is that Anna had never really liked him, but Angela could.

"I thought we changed this," Pete says. " I can’t fucking play it." He's tried, but he knows his own musical limitations, and this wasn't written for him. Pete glances over at Angela but she looks away when their eyes meet.

"That's not the way the conversation went," Patrick says carefully like he's trying to keep his cool, like maybe he doesn't want to fight in front of Angela. Pete has been noticing that Patrick doesn't do a lot of things anymore if Angela is around, but the fighting is the thing that's changed the most. It isn't even particularly conspicuous. Patrick will just refuse to engage at all or leave when it looks like Pete wants to make things personal, when he says "fuck you" instead of "fuck this bridge."

Pete thinks this might actually be increasing their productivity, but he tries not to dwell on that thought too much.

"It would have if you hadn't left," Pete says, and knows it sounds petulant. He crosses his arms over his chest, hunching his shoulders a little.

"No, I would've punched you if I hadn't left," Patrick says, and it's such a statement of fact that Pete would probably be scared if he had the sense to be.

"I think we need a break," Joe says. He's literally tucked away in a corner with his earphones on, and he looks more than a little annoyed. Pete very nearly forgot Joe was there at all until he spoke; he takes a moment to feel like a bad friend for that.

"Yeah, I'm gonna," Patrick says, but lets it trail off, leaving to go over his girlfriend. It takes a minute for Pete to realize that Patrick's been fighting, he just hasn't been with Pete. Pete can't hear anything at first, but he can see that something's wrong in the tense line of Patrick's back.

There are a few moments of hushed arguing before Angela gathers her things, muttering something that Pete can't catch. All he hears is Patrick saying, "I wasn't going to tell you not to come, but yeah, maybe you really shouldn't have," and something about the way Patrick says it is almost cruel.

She leaves; Patrick turns away and doesn't watch her go.

*

Angela breaks up with Patrick one week before the band is finished recording. It takes a while for anyone to catch on, and this is either the absolute worst or perfect timing depending on how you look at it. Patrick is heartbroken, sure, but at least he has something to distract himself from all the inner pain. And if work doesn't help, there's always Pete.

He gives Patrick three days to deal with things on his own and then invites himself over under the pretense of a Will Smith marathon. Pete even brings beer and Chinese from this one place Patrick really likes.

Patrick lets Pete inside in a way that suggests he's not in the mood to put up a fight. Pete's okay with that; it makes things easier.

He leaves the movies and the beer with Patrick and goes to the kitchen to see about fixing Patrick a plate. It takes him five minutes to find where Patrick keeps his plates in the first place. Pete gives up on finding proper silverware after opening two drawers and not finding what he's looking for, and just uses the plastic forks that came with the food. He dumps some rice out on the plate and sticks a fork in it before grabbing the little bag of egg rolls and heading for the living room.

"Here," Pete says, holding out the plate for Patrick to take, and Patrick looks up from the stack of DVDs in his lap.

Patrick says, "Oh hey, thanks," and takes the plate, looking almost lost as he tries to find a place to put it before he sets it on the coffee table.

Pete nods. "No problem." He drops down onto the couch beside Patrick and slouches down, picking out an egg roll and gesturing at the DVDs in Patrick's lap with it. "Did you pick one, or?"

"No, yeah. I was just looking." Patrick peers at a DVD case. "How do you have, like, three seasons of Fresh Prince of Bel Air? Where do you even-- where did you find this?"

"You ask, but you don't really wanna know," Pete says, grinning around a mouthful of food. "Besides, it's a classic. Especially that storyline with Will's father where he comes back and then leaves again."

"And Will cries," Patrick says, setting the stack of DVDs in his lap down on the couch beside him and standing. He plucks up the first on the stack and goes to put the movie on. "Yeah, I remember. You made me watch the rerun of it once, and you cried too."

"Fuck you," Pete says, and takes another bite of his egg roll. "That basement was dusty."

Patrick puts on Men In Black and Pete spends most of the movie watching him surreptitiously. He's trying to give off the vibes of someone who doesn't want to pressure Patrick to talk but will listen if Patrick chooses to take that option. Pete's supportive that way.

They watch the movie mostly in silence with the occasional comment from Pete and a murmur of acknowledgement from Patrick. Patrick only picks at his food, but he drinks every beer that Pete hands him until there's a small cluster of bottles at their feet.

They're quiet for a while longer after the movie ends and the credits start to roll, the music from the TV filling the silence, and then Pete says, "This is good, right? I could've picked other stuff. There could've been more Cusak."

"This is good," Patrick says, nodding, and then huffs out a laugh. "This isn't, like. I'm not-- this isn't some, like, High Fidelity shit. She just said," Patrick starts, but shakes his head. "I guess it doesn't really matter." He sounds tired and resigned, but not really angry, and Pete doesn't get it.

If this was Pete and Angela was his to hurt over, Pete would hate her. He would call her a heartless, unfeeling bitch and he would mean it because Pete gets angry when he's hurt, and it would all feel true in that moment. He knows because he's felt those things about Morgan and Jeanae and everyone before and in between.

Pete nods in agreement anyway, though, and reaches into the bag for another beer to give to Patrick. The credits finish rolling and the DVD loops back to its menu screen. "It wasn't you, it was her?"

Patrick rolls his eyes, but takes the beer Pete hands him and twists off the top. "Fuck off," he mumbles, but he grins like he can't help it, and takes a sip of his drink.

"She wasn't looking for a long-term thing and thought you two were just having fun?" Pete tries. Patrick snorts, but doesn't respond otherwise and keeps his eyes on the TV.

"Right." Pete taps at his own bottle, watching his fingers move against the glass, displacing small drops of condensation that slide down the side. "I mean, I get how she'd mistake you for the partying type. You're such a wild and crazy guy."

"Yeah, I'm, yeah. That's me." Patrick smiles again, but it's quick to fade. He turns to face Pete, his glasses knocked askew, and Patrick looks like he's ready to say something, but he just licks his lips and blinks at Pete.

Pete's gaze drops down to Patrick's mouth for a moment and he closes his eyes. He's way too drunk. The couch feels like it's spinning and swaying beneath him and he's warm all over. Pete tries to focus on the way he can feel the dull throb of his heart pounding in his chest and in his fingertips. He thinks about how he wants to kiss Patrick, how easy it would be to lean in and do it. He doesn't do it.

Pete opens his eyes when he feels the pressure on the couch shift to see Patrick pushing himself up.

"Whoa, okay. Hey," Patrick says, swaying when he gets to his feet, and giggles.

Pete scoots forward on the couch and manages to knock over half the bottles on the floor by his feet in the process, laughing as they clink and clatter to the floor.

Patrick tries to shush Pete, but starts laughing too hard to manage it. He stands there for a moment as his laughter tapers off, looking a little as though he can't quite remember why he got up in the first place.

"New movie?" Pete asks, prompting him.

Patrick's eyes go wide and he giggles again. "Fuck, yeah. Right. Okay."

Eventually, Patrick puts in Wild Wild West and manages to make it back to the couch with little incident. Pete shifts closer when Patrick sits so that when he relaxes, his knee is resting against Patrick's.

"Do you think we could pull off that whole steampunk thing?" Pete asks, half serious. "We could get you a monocle. You'd look good in a monocle."

"Thanks," Patrick says, and it's too soft to really be sarcastic.

*

In the following months Fall Out Boy-- or, Pete mostly-- runs a viral campaign, puts out a mixtape, announces the release of a new album, and does a lot of interviews.

It’s the kind of chaos Pete missed before, even if it means having to answer the same questions over and over. Those parts are boring, but they're also usually the easiest to handle. He tells his interviewers that, "My band suffers because of me. Nobody really cares about who I date or when I get pissed at them." And, "I think people like to talk about those pictures to complain about me when I'm not even doing anything. But I figure, hey, if my mom and my friends can get over it, so can the six other people who keep bringing it up." And, "I don't have a girlfriend, but if there was one thing I could tell my celebrity crush, it would be that I like both versions of her nose."

Their album's release date gets pushed back, leaks, and then is officially released about a week before Christmas, and Pete can't help being surprised that people go out and buy it. It's the same sort of surprise Pete is overcome with when they do a show and they aren't immediately booed off the stage.

They play a handful of shows in small clubs over the next few months before they start the tour proper in April, and that just makes Pete nostalgic in the worst way. It hurts, but it's something he could hurt for forever, like aching for the twist of a knife through his chest. It's only the echo of a memory, and in a few months he won't even have that.

He writes _burning my own village just to put the fire out. what does a mercenary do when the war is over? i need dragons to slay and a princess to save_ on his blog, and then replaces it with the lyrics to The Time of My Life.

That's more of what he means, anyway.

*

When they finally start their tour, it's full of the usual ups and down and adjustments. Pete settles into it right away, finding the rhythm and controlled chaos of it all strangely comforting, until suddenly they've been on the road for a week and Pete doesn't know where his time went.

The sense of disorientation isn't new, but touring isn't the only thing causing it.

If Pete didn't know any better he'd think Patrick was flirting with him. Or, maybe not with him, but in Pete's general direction. It's a slow shift. There's never been an overabundance of boundaries between them-- that isn't a problem until it's _the_ problem-- which is what makes it difficult for Pete to quantify.

Like now, in a Denny's in Oregon, Patrick slides into the booth next to Pete, and picks at Pete's fries. It's cold inside, the kind of dry, sterile cold that happens when the a/c is turned up too high, and Pete can't stop moving. He keeps fidgeting, shifting in his seat and bouncing his leg.

"These fries suck," Patrick says. He presses his thigh against Pete's to still him, and grabs more fries. It's a little bit of a shock, the feel of Patrick's thigh pressing against his, warm and solid. There's something that feels different about the intent behind the action.

"They... suck so much that you just can't stay away from them?" Pete asks, but pushes his plate towards Patrick and stops moving. He isn't hungry anyway.

Patrick shrugs. "I'm hungry."

"You got French toast and eggs," Pete points out, frowning a little at his plate.

"It takes longer to make breakfast, I guess," Patrick mumbled around a fry. Pete catches him shrugging again out of the corner of his eye. He waits for Patrick to shift away or maybe shove his coat between them but Patrick never does, and when Pete leans into him, he feels like he's been invited into that space.

"Yeah," Pete mumbles back. "Totally makes sense." He closes his eyes and feels the way Patrick shakes with silent laughter.

*

The more Pete thinks about it, the less 'flirting' feels right. Flirting usually involves being actively engaged, but it's so much more subtle than that. The word that finally slots into place is 'accessible.' It's less about coy smiles and more like Patrick is open to the idea of Pete. At least, Pete thinks so. It's still not an easy thing for Pete to explain, even to himself, because there's so much that hasn't changed. They're still them, they still fight, but sometimes Pete gets more room to lean in and touch. And sometimes Pete catches Patrick looking at him, his expression unreadable, but Pete's the one left feeling caught out.

They're in a hotel between Denver and Dallas. After a beer and an Ambien or two, Pete stumbles his way to Patrick's room before walking anywhere is no longer option. Technically, Pete and Patrick aren't rooming together, but Pete figures Andy won't care. Patrick might, but Pete's feeling good about the odds of Patrick not waking him up once Pete falls asleep.

There's a mess of Patrick's mostly-dirty clothes piled on the bed, so Pete gathers them into a tighter pile to form a makeshift pillow, making sure one of Patrick's hoodies is on top. It smells musty, like it's been worn at least five times too many. It smells like Patrick, and Pete curls up around Patrick's clothes, falling asleep somewhere close to the end of the bed.

When he wakes up, the first thing he hears is Andy saying, "Do you think he's dreaming he's people?"

Pete stretches carefully so he doesn't fall off the bed, and doesn't so much hear Patrick laugh as he sense it. There's a too-long pause, then a huff of air that's the actual laugh, and more silence as Patrick smiles and turns away. It's not that it's _really_ funny, you know, it's that he just can't not laugh.

"No," Patrick says, "But he runs."

Pete flips them off, holding his hand up in Andy's and then Patrick's general direction, before he curls up tighter and ducks his head to hide from the light shining through the curtains.

Patrick says, "Down, Pete." Then, "Seriously, you have your own bed. Get the fuck off my shit."

"You coulda woke me up," Pete mumbles, getting up finally. He yawns and rubs at his eyes.

Patrick snorts and goes to pick up the clothes Pete had been lying on. "You know, I didn't think of that. Except for how I did. You were comatose."

"You coulda kicked me or, like, pushed me off the bed. 'S never stopped you before," Pete points out.

"What?" Patrick sniffs at the clothes and makes a face, but shrugs it off. "You wanted me to?" He looks over at Pete as if he's seriously expecting an answer. Pete gets that feeling again, like Patrick has him figured out and he's just waiting for Pete to realize it, too, and then it passes.

He doesn't have an answer for Patrick, so he flips him off again and wanders off to go find coffee. There's coffee in the room somewhere, Pete can smell it.

"What state is this?" Pete asks after a while. He thinks they might be in Florida. It feels like Florida, anyway, but there's something oddly southwestern about the wallpaper in the hotel.

"New Mexico," Patrick answers. When Pete glances over, Patrick is sniffing at the clothes in his arms. "I think you funked my shit up."

"You mean more. He funked your shit up _more_ ," Andy chimes in, flopping down onto his bed.

Pete finds the cart with the pot of coffee and pours himself a cup, taking a large gulp of it. It's bitter and burns his tongue, but he sits at it again gulp anyway. "I took a bath," Pete says. He runs his tongue over his teeth and barely feels the film of plaque covering them with how much his tongue is tingling.

"Last week," Patrick says.

Pete's eyebrows go up. "How do you even know that?"

"Because you took my hotel soap," Patrick answers easily, and starts to shove his clothes back into his suitcase without folding them.

"Yeah, well." Pete shrugs. "Dirty took a bite out of mine." More accurately, Pete had dared him to. He hadn't dared Dirty to swallow it, though.

Pete holds his cup up in front of his face, trying not to laugh as he watches Patrick shove the rest of his things back into his suitcase. The odds are that Patrick meant to get them washed the night before but forgot about it. It isn't much of a guessing game; Patrick usually forgets.

"Anyway," Pete goes on, "It was soap. Soap is self-cleaning."

"It was _gray_ after you used it." Patrick shoves and tugs to get his suitcase closed, eyeing it warily for a moment as if it might spontaneously burst open before he steps away from it. "Andy even saw it."

"Andy also didn't care," Andy says, and Patrick rolls his eyes.

"That's not the point," he says. "The point is that you shouldn't take stuff without asking."

"It was _soap_ ," Pete mumbles back from behind his cup.

"Yeah," Patrick says, sitting down and picking up a magazine, "Like I said, that's not the point."

*

Two weeks before the end of tour, Patrick kisses Pete.

"I'm just saying, it still sucks that Andie doesn't choose Duckie," Pete says. They're not watching Pretty In Pink, it's just a subject that comes up every now and then. It isn't particularly relevant, but the later it gets, the less it matters.

"Yeah, I know. I know," Patrick says, because he always agrees with Pete about this anyway, and then kisses him. It's awkward at first. The angle is off and Patrick is still wearing his glasses, but then Pete turns in to Patrick and Patrick leans in closer to put his hand on Pete's cheek, and it's better. When they pull apart, Patrick's glasses are crooked and the lenses are fogged.

Pete's head is a mess of thoughts, but the only thing that comes out is, "What the fuck?" He shakes his head, because that isn't what he meant to say, and he's getting the feeling that they've done this before anyway.

"Yeah," Patrick says. Something like a nervous smile tilts up the corners of his mouth, and he removes his glasses to polish them off with the hem of his shirt, looking down and keeping his eyes on what he's doing. He doesn't look back up until his glasses are firmly in place again, blinking at Pete a few times as his eyes readjust.

Pete clears his throat, rubs at his nose and sniffs. "I thought you said this was-- I thought you said no."

"I said it was a bad idea."

Pete frowns. "And that's not the same thing?"

"I don't know," Patrick says, slowly. "Does it sound like the same thing to you?”

"Hey, fuck you."

"Yeah, okay, no. I'm sorry. It isn't. It's not the same thing." Patrick shrugs. "I mean, it's like. Do you remember that time Joe got those tacos from some van on the side of the road? And we were all hungry, right? But the next day he was the only one with the runs so bad that he was actually dehydrated."

Pete remembers. He would've eaten some, too, but he was being a vegetarian that week. "So you're saying I'm sketchy roadside tacos?"

"I'm saying just because I want--" Patrick stops and his expression is caught somewhere between irritated and embarrassed. "Just because you want something doesn't mean it's a good idea."

"You really aren't selling me on this, man," Pete says, and he's distantly aware that for all that he wants Patrick, he's making this harder than it probably has to be. He smoothes his palms down his thighs because they're sweaty, but he tries to make it look almost casual.

"That's because it's not even. That's not the point. You're not a bad idea, your-- the timing was just off."

"And now it's not?"

Patrick shrugs again. "And now it's not."

It's easy, easier than Pete would have expected things to end up, and then he blinks and the moment has passed.

*

They don't talk about it anymore after that because there's nothing to talk about or because there isn't enough time or some combination of the two. Pete doesn't quite remember why anymore.

He's busy anyway. There are business related emails that need replying to and people being wrong on the internet that he needs to correct, until there aren't. Then they're in Canada, backstage after sound check when all Pete is busy with is waiting. Pete likes Canada. Everyone seems so genuinely nice. The kind of nice that makes him want to talk about how good it is to be somewhere "real" after the superficiality of Los Angeles. Sometimes he thinks he'd move, but then he'd have to find something new to complain about.

Pete catches himself staring at Patrick and has a sudden sense-memory, feels the texture of inside-out cotton socks against his tongue. His mouth tastes stale. He wipes at it with the back of his hand reflexively, glancing away when Patrick looks up.

"Was there something you wanted?" Patrick asks. Pete tries to shake the feeling that Patrick is making fun of him.

"What? No." He pulls up his hood and tugs his cuffs over his hands.

"Really?" Patrick looks back down at his laptop, frowning as he taps at key once and then again more aggressively. "Because you keep, like, looking at me."

Pete nods slowly. "And how does that make you feel, Patrick?" He raises a hand to his mouth, gnawing at the cuff pulled over his knuckles. It tastes a little like ketchup, but he can't remember the last time he had anything with ketchup on it.

Patrick glances over at Pete and huffs, almost a laugh, as if there's something just endlessly amusing about everything Pete chooses to be.

Pete wants there to be something to talk about.

"You know--" he starts, mumbling. The words are there, just at the tip of his tongue, but he let its hang.

Patrick closes his laptop and pushes himself up. He stretches, raising his hands high above his head and raising his eyebrows at Pete, prompting him silently. His shirt rides up, exposing a pale strip of skin, and he reaches down quickly to tug it back into place.

Pete shakes his head and looks away, then shifts to tuck both his hands under his thighs, and shrugs for good measure. "Kind of forgot," he mumbles after a while. He feels stupid and anxious all of a sudden.

"Right." Patrick nods, crossing the room to pat the top of Pete's head as he left. "Well, you know. Maybe it wasn't worth it."

*  
In Illinois, Patrick curls his fingers in the back of Pete's hair, warm and comfortable like they belong there, and Pete goes still. Not wary, but calm all over and quiet inside. It only lasts for a second, and then they're high-fiving and heading out onstage.

In Ohio, Pete takes advantage of the new space Patrick seems to be carving out for him. He lies down to rest his head on Patrick's lap, and Patrick reaches down when no one's looking, and combs his fingers through Pete's hair.

In Minnesota after their last show of the tour, Pete gets tugged into a dressing room and pushed back against the door, and Patrick kisses him. Pete's hand finds its way to the back of Patrick's neck, slipping against sweat-slick skin, and Patrick laughs against his lips. It's the fifth time they've kissed and it's still new. Gentle and firm, like they're both asking for and giving each other permission.

No one knows or suspects anything. There's no reason for them to, but Pete's always been a sucker for even the illusion of hiding in plain sight.

*

When tour ends, Pete doesn't see Patrick for a week. It's good, really, necessary. Pete gets the chance to acclimate to being at home and relearning to sleep on a bed that doesn't move beneath him. He gets time away from everyone and everything for a little while, and it's hell.

He makes himself wait it out for seven days, anyway-- tells himself he'll be glad he did it later-- until he calls Patrick. When Patrick answers, Pete gets the urge to say, "I miss you." The feeling bubbles up in his chest and the words stick in his throat. "Hey. You should come over," he says instead.

There's a pause before Patrick laughs. He says, "Yeah? Sure, alright," and hangs up before Pete can say goodbye.

When Patrick arrives and Pete lets him in, Patrick kisses Pete on the cheek as soon as the door is closed while Hemmy is sniffing at their feet. It's quick and easy like they do this all the time, and then Patrick's headed for Pete's living room. There's the light clink of dog tags as Hemmy pads away when he's clear neither Patrick or his owner are going to give him any attention.

They sit and Patrick updates Pete on whatever his family has updated him on, and Pete relaxes as he listens. While Patrick talks, Pete shifts closer, and when he pauses for breath Pete kisses him. He can do that that now, he remembers. Pete can climb onto Patrick's lap and tangle his fingers in the front of Patrick's shirt. He can sigh against Patrick's lips, and press closer when Patrick wraps his arms around Pete.

Pete doesn't make lofty comparisons to summer romances, but he does mumble, "So does this mean we're going steady?" And he maybe starts to sing I Think We're Alone Now as he tries to get his hand down Patrick's pants.

 

*

When Pete was nineteen he dated a girl named Sandi. She dotted the "i" in her name with an "x" and kissed other girls for Pete to watch when they went to parties because she knew it made him jealous, and he was in love with her. He thought she hated him a little, but the sex was good. That had to be something.

They had sex after dinner on their three month anniversary and tried to act like there was nothing even a little sentimental about it. Sandi stripped and lied down, spread out over a Strawberry Shortcake comforter that her enjoyment of had nothing to do with irony, and Pete went down on her.

He got her off three times in a row, but only touched himself the third time when she held him in place, pushing her hips up hard against his mouth as she came, curling her fingers too tight in his hair. Pete jerked himself off fast and came so hard that he was dizzy afterward.

"God," she said, breathless and beautiful in the kind of way almost everyone was after a good orgasm. "God, you're such a fucking little freak, you know that?"

Pete looked at her messy hair and flushed skin and tried not to be sick, because it felt too true. "Mmn," he hummed, and kissed her hip.

They broke up the next week, and Pete did something that got him a black eye and grounded for the foreseeable future.

There's not a lot that seems comparable about that moment and what's happening now with his hand and mouth wrapped around Patrick's dick, but that memory floats to the surface anyway.

This is the fourth time Pete's sucked a guy off, but it's the first time he's done it without feeling like it was some kind of dare. It's the first time he's wanted to do it.

He focuses on the slide of his hand and his mouth on Patrick, on the way Patrick's breath hitches when he's close, and then how it stops for a second when he comes. Pete swallows as much as he can and strokes Patrick through it until Patrick makes a noise of complaint, and stills Pete's hand.

"Can I--?" Pete starts to ask, but it doesn't go anywhere. He rises up on his knees instead, fumbling to get his jeans undone. Pete presses his cheek to Patrick's stomach, one hand on Patrick's hip and the other wrapped tight around his own dick. He feels Patrick huff out a laugh before the sound registers, but Pete can't care.

Patrick says, "Yeah, okay," through more laughter as he sifts his fingers through Pete's hair. It's almost a soothing gesture, which is why Pete isn't expecting it when Patrick curls his fingers tight and pulls. He does it again, and that pushes Pete over the edge, a soft cry caught in his throat, his heart pounding in his ears.

Pete looks up when he's caught his breath, watches the way Patrick catches his bottom lip between his teeth, but doesn't quite manage to stifle a smile, and Pete feels sick. He feels raw and exposed and Patrick is _laughing at him_.

"Don't. Fucking, just," Pete hears himself say, but the words don't feel like his own, don't sound like him. He digs his nails into Patrick's sides.

"Fuck," Patrick gasps. He twists at first, trying to get away, then grabs at Pete's wrists, digging his fingers into the tendon's until Pete lets go. Patrick keeps a hold of Pete, holding his wrists together and Pete growls low in his throat, trying to wrench himself away. "What-- Pete. Use your fucking words, Pete."

"Fuck you."

"Try again," Patrick says, but his fingers loosen their grip around Pete's wrists.

"Let go," Pete grits out, and doubles over when Patrick does, holding his hands to his chest like he's been burned. He can't breathe, and when Pete closes his eyes, the floor dips and spins beneath him.

"Pete?" Patrick voice is suddenly cautious, and Pete can't stop himself from flinching at the sound of it.

"Fine. I'm-- can you leave me alone? Leave me alone," Pete says in a rush. He moves to plant both hands on the floor, keeping his head down, and tries to take a deep breath.

Patrick says, "Yeah, okay," hesitating for a second before he leaves, and somewhere far off Pete is grateful that Patrick's such a good sport about being told to fuck off somewhere else in his own place.

*

In the morning, Pete wakes up on Patrick's couch with his jeans on the floor and a blanket bunched up at his feet. He rubs the sleep from his eyes and listens to the sound of running water. There's no chance he's falling asleep again, but he lies there for a few more minutes, just listening. He gets up when the water shuts off and he hears Patrick muttering something uncharitable to or about the toaster.

Pete is slow to get up, stretching and stumbling on his way to the kitchen. He doesn't say anything, and neither does Patrick, pouring Pete a glass of orange juice and handing it over without a word. It's the organic kind with the pulp in it, and when Pete takes a sip it's like drinking an entire pureed orange.

He clears his throat and says, "Thanks," and "Good morning," because Pete's more polite than people give him credit for.

"Do you want breakfast or something?" Patrick asks.

Pete shakes his head. He's not hungry and he wants coffee, but Patrick doesn't keep any in his house. Pete says, "No, I'm good," and nurses his glass of orange juice.

It's only a little awkward, and Pete thinks that's mostly his fault because all Patrick's doing is making breakfast. Pete jumps when the toast pops up. It smells like it's half burnt, but Patrick puts margarine and some kind of jam on it anyway, and takes a bite of the first slice.

Patrick is halfway through his second piece of toast when Pete says, "So you're just gonna stand there?"

"I guess," Patrick says. His mouth is full and there's jam at the corner of his mouth. Pete gestures at his own mouth with a meaningful look, and Patrick licks the bit of jam away. Patrick rinses off the plate and his hands when he's finished. Pete watches him shake the excess water off his hands, and wipe them off on his pajama pants even though there's a dish towel on the counter.

"You sure you don't want anything?" Patrick asks, making to leave the kitchen.

Pete shakes his head and holds up his glass of juice, and follows Patrick out to the living room.

They sit, and when Patrick turns on the television, the History channel is revealing some old, withered sheet of parchment that's actually a slave contract. Pete knows because he watched this program five times back to back before he finally fell asleep.

"So, I'm sorry," Pete says, first. It's a relatively easy place to start.

"Okay," Patrick replies. He mutes the TV and turns to face Pete. "It would help if you could maybe tell me what happened," he adds when Pete doesn't say anything else.

"Yeah, I don't know." Pete frowns down at his juice, tapping a finger against the glass. "I kind of, uh. It was weird, I guess," he says, and immediately tries to think of how to clarify that.

"Yeah, it was, so--"

"So you laughed at me," Pete says, cutting Patrick off, sharp like he's suddenly just realized how much it bothers him.

Patrick nods, asks, "Why do you think I was laughing at you?"

"Don't do that. That fucking "I'm sorry you think I was being offensive" bullshit. I don't think you were laughing at me, I know you were."

"Fine, yeah. I laughed. I laugh at you a lot Pete," Patrick says. The way he shifts away from Pete, putting space between them, looks unconscious. "What makes this different?"

Pete bounces a knee, agitated. "Nothing. Hey, maybe I got sick of it. I'm allowed to get sick of you."

"You freaked out on me. _Literally_. That's not nothing."

"So what?" Pete asks, but he's wondering if he left marks.

Patrick's snaps, almost shouting when he says, "So own your shit, Pete!"

"Fine, fuck. I wanted," Pete says, and can't finish. It's not something he has the words for. His brain supplies the mental image of him rolling over to show Patrick his belly, and Pete starts to laugh. It's comes out a little hysterical.

"What? You wanted what, Pete? Because it wasn't fucking funny to watch you have a panic attack or whatever the fuck that was," Patrick says. His ears are turning red and there's a blush spreading across his cheeks. "I didn't know what was wrong or what I'd done. You freaked and then told me to leave. Do you honestly not see how that's a problem? Or how I might have been worried or just..." Patrick trails off losing steam.

"No, no. Okay, okay, okay. Patrick, look. Patrick. This," Pete says, fumbling to set down his glass. He drops to his knees and shuffles to fit himself in the space between Patrick's legs. The friction from the carpet makes his knees burn. "This. I wanted this. A lot."

Patrick frowns and goes tense when Pete places his hands on Patrick's legs, "What--?"

"I don't know. I don't think about it a lot," Pete adds, after a few seconds of Patrick just watching him. That's almost a lie, and he already feels stupid for telling it because Patrick will figure it out anyway. "But I'm. I'd be, uh, on my hands and knees? And you. I'd just. You'd--" _You'd let me belong to you_ , Pete wants to say. He mumbles, "You'd let me be with you," instead.

It's close, close enough that Pete feels his stomach drop. He feels sick all over again, heavy and light at the same time, as if he's sinking and floating. He looks at his hands on Patrick's thighs, spreading his fingers, and waits for Patrick to say something.

"Okay," Patrick says, eventually. He bites his lip and looks off to the side for a moment before repeating himself. "Okay."

Pete nods until Patrick's response catches up with him. "Okay?

"No, I mean I think I get it. Just." Patrick sighs and rubs his hands over his face. "Did it ever occur to you that maybe it's not what you want that's the problem, but how you're fucking incapable of asking for anything without turning it into... into _this_?" It's not even a dig. It sounds too tired for it to be a dig.

"Yeah," Pete says, and moves to hug Patrick, tucking his head down to press his cheek against Patrick's belly. "But you'd miss the drama and the intrigue."

Patrick doesn't hug Pete back, but he doesn't push him away either, so Pete figures that means he's been more or less forgiven.

That night Pete tweets _all i own is shit_ and _im the lost idle of a false god_ and _yeah yeah i ment idol. like billy minus the white wedding. wish i culd pull of that hair_

The internet at large only agrees with the first two thirds of those statements.

*

There's no one long, drawn out conversation. They don't make a written list of rules and regulations or anything, and right now Pete likes it best that way. He likes how he starts to lose count of how many times they start sentences with, "would you like it if?" Or how many times he starts things with, "I think if... maybe." There's a certain amount of safety in hypotheticals. It's not exactly the most effective mode of communication, but Pete's finding it hard to talk about because--

"It's kind of weird, right? I mean, it's a little fucked up." He laughs and tries not to notice how Patrick doesn't.

Pete's a little defensive when he adds, "Look, okay? I'm just like. I'm trying to figure some stuff out and--"

"Yeah," Patrick says, raising his voice and cutting Pete off. That's the thing, though. I don't want to be how you figure out you're fucked up."

"I didn't--" Pete starts, except he did. He did say that.

"You did, Pete," Patrick says, because sometimes he's that sharp. Pete loves and hates him for that. "And that's kind of a problem, because I don't want to help you do that. You get that, right? You get that that's not okay?"

Pete mumbles a, "Yeah. I got it." He doesn't want to have this talk ever, but especially not now. "I'm getting something to drink. Do you want something?"

Patrick doesn't answer, but Pete brings him back a bottle of water anyway.

*

They do manage to talk details over the next few days because, despite contrary opinions, Pete is fully capable of behaving as a rational adult. He talks about following Patrick on his hands and knees and doesn't sing _I Just Wanna Be Your Dog_ or _Doghouse Blues_ or _Dog Eat Dog_.

It's full of as much embarrassment and awkward pauses as Pete's afraid it'll be, but it happens. And somewhere towards the end Patrick says, "Sure. I mean, yeah, I like it. I like you."

That's not the end of it, not by far, but that's the most important part. The rest is just figuring out the details.

*

"So maybe we could try it. Just a half hour or something. A couple of times," Pete says. "Like, I don't know." He rolls his eyes, shrugs a little. "A trial period or something." He sounds like an infomercial.

"Okay," Patrick agrees, and then, "Wait, what? You can't ask me stuff when I'm, like." He points to his headphones, only halfway on, and his laptop.

"Yeah, I know," Pete says, because he does, but he doesn't apologize because he always does it anyway. The only drawback is that Pete always ends up having to repeat himself.

"So?"

For a moment, Pete is afraid Patrick is going to make him spell it out: _Please would Patrick let Pete follow him around like a lost puppy for a little while? Pretty please?_

What Pete does say is, "You know, what we talked about the other day? I though maybe we could--"

"Yeah? Oh. Yeah. Alright," Patrick says. "Give me maybe five minutes," he adds, taking off and unplugging his headphones. Pete's suddenly anxious about this, about what it means to have Patrick's undivided attention.

Pete wiggles out of his jeans, leaving them in a puddle on the floor around his feet, and when he looks up Patrick's watching him. Pete gets down on his hands and knees and Patrick-- he doesn't ignore Pete exactly. It feels like it when Pete follows him out of the living room and into his bedroom, but he realizes that it's really just Patrick refusing to make a big deal out of Pete and anything he does.

At some point Pete loses track of time. He isn't sure how or when he managed to get out of his head, but one minute he's curled up at Patrick's feet, and the next Patrick's gently nudging him to get up.

The first thing he says is, "That totally wasn't a half hour." His knees ache, but he ignores it, stretching his arms forward and arching his back.

"Forty-five minutes. You kind of--" Patrick says, and Pete looks up to see Patrick make some wavy motion that might mean "spaced out". "You looked like you were asleep."

"I think I got rug burn on my knees," Pete says, sitting up so that he's kneeling, but it sounds far off. He feels absent, like he's floating above and somewhere to the right of himself. He rubs his hands down his thighs and his palms sting and tingle.

Patrick says something about knee pads, and if Pete were all there he'd probably make a joke about that, because it seems like a no-brainer but he's pretty sure Patrick didn't come up with that on his own anyway.

"Pete?" Patrick says, then, "Pete," more firmly and Pete nods because he's paying attention, really. "Okay?"

"Fine, yeah. Yeah. I'm." Pete laughs a little, almost giggling, and puts his hand over is mouth to keep the sound in. He doesn't know why he just did that. "You?" he asks in return eventually, because that matters.

"Yeah, I'm. Yeah." Patrick stretches his arm out over the back of the couch and Pete fits himself into the space that leaves for him, his head pillowed on Patrick's thigh. He feels Patrick shift a little under him. When Patrick settles, his hand comes down to rest on Pete's shoulder, an anchor to keep from drifting away.

*

He doesn't think about it anymore. Not when Patrick kisses him or when they're watching Lady Vengeance and Patrick's leaning heavily against Pete's side, half asleep.

He doesn't think about it at all, not on purpose. It starts to slip in, though, in the quiet moments. It's something hovering on the edge of his periphery and edging its way into Pete's direct line of sight. And the worst part is that the only person Pete is fighting with is himself. He can have this, this _thing_ , this stupid fucking fucked up fucking-- he can have it if he wants it. He just.

All he has to do is ask. All Pete has to say is "I want" and "please" and that would be enough. Patrick would know and that would be enough.

It just feels so much like losing.

Pete doesn't stop to wonder about what game he's supposed to be playing in the first place.

 

*

Pete itches.

It starts out as a light irritation in the back of his mind when he wakes up and falls out of his bed that morning. He tries to brush it off, because he's always hated mornings (or the first hour awake after he slept, whichever comes first). He ignores it at lunch when he can't find anything around worth eating besides a half-empty bag of Reese's pieces and some cinnamon flavored gum. He ignores that the sun is too bright and that his skin is too tight and his clothes too loose. He ignores it all until he can't anymore.

Pete itches, is two seconds from clawing his skin off it doesn't crawl away first, so he calls Patrick.

"Can I hang at yours for a while?" he asks. Consciously, he relaxes his jaw and does his best to sound normal, like there isn't pleasepleaseplease tacked onto the end of his question.

Patrick says, "Yeah, sure. I have something I wanted you to hear anyway," and adds, "I can order out and we can watch a movie later too, if you want," like he needs to sweeten the deal.

Pete's already pacing around to find his keys. By the time he says, "See you in a bit," he's getting in his car already, slamming the door shut and starting the engine. He doesn't remember the drive and the short walk to Patrick's building, being buzzed up, or walking in to knock on Patrick's door.

Patrick opens the door to let Pete in. He says, "Hi," and smiles, but it fades when he looked Pete over. Pete isn’t sure if he'll ever get used to that, seeing the difference between Patrick looking and Patrick paying attention.

"Hey," Pete says, but doesn't move forward to go inside.

They stare at each other for the slow count of ten Mississippi’s before Pete blinks. Patrick raises an eyebrow, one corner of his mouth quirking up in a half smile, and Pete drops his gaze down and to the right to stare at a spot just beside Patrick's shoulder.

Pete fidgets under Patrick's continued scrutiny, shifting from foot to foot, and takes a deep breath. It isn't the wanting that keeps getting to him, it's the asking. It's admitting that he wants something that he has to ask someone else for.

Pete still feels a little like he's losing, but that isn't Patrick's fault, so he asks. He drops to his knees, hard enough for them to sting and ache, and scoots forward until he can tip his head forward to rest against Patrick's hip.

Patrick sighs, says, "Jesus. At least wait until you're inside." He sounds exasperated, but Pete hears the smile underneath.

Patrick steps back and Pete bends the rest of the way down, looking down at his hands splayed against the carpet. He waits by the door while Patrick locks up and then follows after him to the kitchen.

Pete feels the light scratch and tickle of the carpet against his palms, and shivers a little when carpet turns into cool linoleum. He tries to follow Patrick as he moves through the kitchen, crowding around him until Patrick almost trips over him.

"I'm not going anywhere, so stop it," Patrick says mildly, but firm enough for Pete pay attention. He points to the kitchen's entrance, making Pete sit there while he poured a glass of water.

Patrick is taking too long, or it feels like it, and Pete starts to feel that same itch something burrowing under his skin and crawling down his spine. He shifts forward on his hands, sits back on his heels, and then leans forward again. Pete repeats the sequence three more times before Patrick leaves for the living room.

When Patrick sits down, setting the glass of water safely on the table, Pete moves close enough to rest his chin on Patrick's knee and closes his eyes.

He feels _pleasepleaseplease_ right down to the tips of his toes, and then _yesthankyouyes_ when Patrick reaches out to sift his fingers through Pete's hair. Something-- everything in Pete unravels, and all he can do is shift to rub his cheek against Patrick's knee, a soft sound of contentment caught in his throat. Another _thank you_.

"Yeah, yeah," Patrick says, quiet and affectionate. "I know."


End file.
